


Is Best Which Is The First

by Meduseld



Category: Aquaman (2018), Aquaman (Comics), DCU, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Alien Biology, Arranged Marriage, Atlantis should be superhero flavored Game Of Thrones so this is that, Cultural Differences, Dubious Consent, Incest, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Orm's canon terrible father too, Royalty, Wedding Night, Yes I used that tag again, and all that implies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-13
Updated: 2019-01-13
Packaged: 2019-10-09 03:37:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17399300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meduseld/pseuds/Meduseld
Summary: Weddings come with wedding nights.





	Is Best Which Is The First

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah idk why I’m fixated on this scenario either (and I started this before I saw the movie so it’s not strictly compliant)

Orm checks to make sure the knife is still there, first.

It is, hidden by the headboard, tucked behind a false cover that had been there for centuries, for times just like these.

For all that Arthur was a novelty, arranged marriages and strange bedfellows weren’t. Atlantis looked after her own, when they obeyed her. And surely, even in this, Orm was more her son than Arthur.

If he wasn’t, some enterprising maid, probably with a palm greased by Vulko, would have gotten rid of the knife.

It eases something, standing there refusing to shiver in torn underclothes, alone in the cold currents swirling around the dimly lit room, to know that it is always an option. For his husband or for himself, he doesn’t know.

Reluctantly, he steps away from the hidden knife, making sure everything looks innocuous again, still and calm under the water.

Arthur won’t be long, now, even though it feels like Orm has had the room to himself for hours. His skin is still remembers the warmth from the crowded royal hall their wedding was hypocritically toasted to.

But he’s cooling fast, despite the fact that he’s more clothed than most brides by the time they reach their own beddings.

 They hadn’t dared strip him fully, not with the way he had stayed proud and tall, defiant, not with how wary they were of Arthur and how different he was from the Atlantean ideal. The one Orm had embodied, at first unwillingly and then calculatedly, his entire life.

He wanted them to feel like they were throwing him to the sharks, banishing from the lights of the city.

Because that’s what it felt like to Orm, like a coating on his skin, since Arthur came home. Since the crown passed to him and Orm was a prince, again.

Prince Consort now, which makes his hackles rise every time someone says it. That was his father’s title.

He could get in the bed, he supposes, to stop shivering. That’s at least part of why brides are stripped, anyway, so they’ll be warm between the sheets, waiting for their husbands.

Orm refuses.

He hasn’t made anything easy for Arthur so far. There’s no reason to start now. They’ll find a balance or their marriage will end, one way or another.

Thousands of years of recorded history bear that out.

Maybe Orm will even be one of the famous ones, locked in a tower to starve or hunted down by his husband’s hounds or torn to pieces by his horses. It’s unlikely though.

Arthur’s eyes are kind.

It’s not a quality Orm has ever found useful.

And anyway he doesn’t even own any hunting dogs or war horses yet, other than Orm’s own.

Orm brought no dowry, because he was marrying into his own house and everything that was his was already Arthur’s.

Like he can read Orm’s thoughts, Arthur bursts through the door with that explosive wild grace he brings to everything.

Their wedding guests hadn’t been half as prudish as they had with Orm. Arthur barely had a scrap of fabric on, and the little he had, just barely clinging to his hips, was obscenely bulged.

No wonder they were curious.

It was one thing to know that it would be that way and another to actually _see_ it, in one way or another. That was probably the reason he wasn’t fully naked, the intimidating fullness of it, the practically pornographic boldness of it, always extended from his body with no slit to hide in.

But that’s not what hooks Orm’s eyes and demands their attention.

It’s the elegant dark lines that stain his flesh, making him look even more alien to this place of weak sunlight and fish belly pallor.

Arthur looks like a barbarian king from a lurid historical volume, chiseled muscle and wild hair. Orm must be the blushing princess then, awaiting her ravishment.

It makes him angry all over again.

“You good?” Arthur says, still pressed against the door like he’s afraid the noblewomen are going to batter it down to get a closer look at what’s between his legs.

Or maybe it’s the way Orm has just realized he’s clutching what remains of his underclothes against his skin.

He tears his hands away, with the fabric, trying to seem bold. He refuses to be intimidated, even though the room already feels too hot, too close.

It’s like Arthur boils the water with his presence.

“This has to be done” he says, trying for commanding and landing on obvious, almost tongue tied.

Arthur moves closer, still cautious, and Orm moves back before he can stop himself.

With a flash of apocalyptic fury, he realizes he hasn’t been so callow since he was a little boy, taking his first lessons in war from scarred veterans. They hadn’t held back, and Orm quickly realized fear was useless. It would, in fact, be far easier if he were meeting Arthur on the battlefield. At least he would be sure of what to do.

But there’s nothing for it now. Orm keeps going, moving until he’s dropping onto the bed in a way that hopefully looks intentional.

Arthur doesn’t budge.

“You ok?” he calls out, accent grating even on just two words, painfully foreign. Painfully concerned.  

“I know what we’re supposed to do” he says back, as acidly as he can manage.

Arthur seems to think it’s Atlantis that’s backward, but Orm received extensive education in every subject, this included, even if he has never actually done this or anything like it before.

Arthur’s eyebrow quirks and he wants to scream. Just because _he_ has, and only the gods know just what manner of people of the surface he’s done it with, doesn’t mean he gets to look at Orm like he’s fragile.

He chose to not take a lover, to reach his marriage bed a virgin.

It was what was right, proper, expected for his position. To hear the ministers and assorted priests and priestesses, it’s a virtue to aspire to, Orm is an example to measure up to.

Though of course most of those men and women got rid of theirs as quickly as possible, marriage pledges and vows of chastity notwithstanding.

But Orm never wanted to trust anyone with this, with himself. His body is the one thing he’s ever had total control over.

And too many regents over the years have died from a knife between the ribs, placed there by a lover.

Given the subtle weapon still hidden in the headboard, Orm’s keenly aware of that fact.

There’s other dangers, too, to lovers.

For a moment, when Arthur had pushed open the doors of the Grand Hall and surged forward onto the stones like he belonged, Orm’s heart had been glad.

His brother, his only living blood, had come home to him at last, his wildest fantasies fulfilled.

The feeling had faded quickly.

In his childhood dreams, Arthur had been a protector, a confidant, the one person to love Orm, selflessly and with his whole heart. That Arthur had been a shade that never existed. That was ever clearer by the day.

But Orm tries not to think on it. And it’s not difficult. He has plenty of practice mentally banishing the more bruising, or even cutting, parts of his family.

Arthur is still staring, and it feels like fingers tracing over Orm’s skin. He glances down and sees that what little covers his modesty is having a hard time of it, and he’s not even hard yet. He’d had lessons on human anatomy, too.

Something inside him shrinks back. How big will it be, how thick, how unbearably painful? At least he won’t have any trouble staining the sheets.

And it’s not like he hasn’t shed blood for duty before. He has to remember that. This is for Atlantis.

“Well?” Orm says, bolder than he feels, exposed and truly cold, now. As much as he wants to be very far from here, the heat of Arthur’s skin seems steadily more appealing.

His brother finally looks up and holds his gaze for a long moment, eyes darkening with lust and Orm suddenly wants to cry with relief.

He’s never hungered for approval before but there’s an animal satisfaction to seeing Arthur’s manhood, fully flushed and hard and achingly red now that he’s finally taken off what little he had on, and all because of Orm.

Even if there’s another part that’s well and truly terrified now at how alien he is.

This is what Orm is bound to, the rest of his life, however short that may be.

His brother who is half a monster, raised in a world that Orm has only glimpsed in the poison and pandemonium they spew into his home.

Arthur’s hands are careful on his hips, the thumbs rubbing thoughtfully. His skin is calloused.

He’s not looking into Orm’s eyes now, or even close to it, and he’s almost grateful. Orm can feel his pulse thudding dully in his throat, taste blood in his mouth.

Arthur’s skin is blissfully warm, draped against his legs and that’s when he realizes that they are protectively closed, his knees digging into the firm muscles of his husband’s middle.

They’re not an exact mirror of Orm’s, a small difference that seems incredibly vast, easier to focus on than the fact that the spaces between their legs both match and don’t.

Arthur carefully puts his hands on Orm’s kneecaps and he can feel his own muscles tighten in response, all on their own.

“You alright?” he says, concerned, and Orm swallows once, twice, can’t be sure his voice won’t shake.

The primal heat and weight of him on Orm’s naked skin is stoking something like panic.

“Just- just” he tries and can’t say it, can’t order his brother, his husband, to do what needs doing.

Because it turns out that in the end, Orm is as worthless as his father always said.

.All he needs to do is spread his legs and lie back to keep a fraction of what he’s owed, to keep a true son of the House of Atlan by the throne and he _can’t_.

Orm knows his uses and that they are few, but apparently they don’t even include something thousands of whores do down in the seedier reaches of the city.

Maybe the dagger would be best used on himself, after all.  

_“Hey_ ” Arthur whispers, like he’s gentling a horse. Some pathetic part of Orm is grateful, that even though he’s ruined this, all of it, his husband doesn’t sound angry, isn’t prying his legs apart like a farmer with a stubborn oyster.

Arthur’s hands move over his skin carefully, lightly, barely touching him, like he was afraid Orm might break entirely.

He traces his thumbs along the hard ridges of Orm’s cheekbones, looking into his eyes like he’s searching for something. When he leans in closer, Orm’s heartbeat has slowed, enough to purse his own lips to touch Arthur’s, brief and chaste.

“What are you doing?” he whispers, still half drunk on his own fear.

Arthur shrugs, long and languid, kissing his eyelids, his forehead. Tenderly, in a way Orm can hardly believe, in a way he's never seen or heard of, he moves back to the corner of Orm's lips.

His kiss borders on loving, and Orm doesn’t want to give into it but he does, defenseless in the face of gentleness, an enemy he’s never faced, turning his head to let Arthur lick his way into his mouth.

He tastes like the wedding feast, cake and spiced wine. It already seems like it was a million years ago that they sat at the high table, next to each other, the very picture of perfect newlyweds. Or close enough.

Orm supposes this is perfect in its own way too, from how he feels more exposed and more vulnerable than he ever did in battle, the way brides are supposed to feel.

And Arthur is oddly perfect too, so sure and so patient in a way Orm never dared to hope for. Maybe he wasn’t quite a shade, after all.

Or maybe this is only the way it will be this first time. Arthur’s patience can’t be endless.

At that thought, that he might never have this again, he moves to take what he wants.

Orm’s fingers tremble when they reach up to trace the lines that paint his husband’s neck, following them down to his chest and further.

They’re like nothing he’s ever seen before and now, the skin growing hot under his touch, they bring a pang of arousal, too.

His hands catalogue them with a strategist’s instinct and his tongue follows with a different kind of impulse.

The taste of Arthur’s skin is shocking and intoxicating, and Orm loses himself in it.

Arthur nuzzles his hair, kisses his neck, before moving his hands back down to Orm’s hips, rubbing circles against them thoughtfully. 

Then one of his fingers traces a line along Orm’s middle, moving down but not quite between his thighs.

Arthur presses his forehead back to Orm’s, who suddenly remembers just how naked he is. 

“I want...I want this to be good for you” he rumbles, and the rawness makes something in him _ache_.

 “If you don’t like it, any of it, just tell me and I’ll stop” he says, eyes open and locked on Orm’s. He can feel himself nod.

The finger finally moves lower, circling, and careful, along his slit. It sits oddly for a moment inside him.

Then Arthur crooks it lightly, and a pang of pleasure shoots straight through Orm like a blow, reverberating sweetly.

Against his cheek, he feels Arthur’s lips curling into a smile.

One finger turns to two, the delicious sting of it sending shockwaves of pleasure through Orm, who can’t help making little noises.

He had only ever explored his body’s capacity for feeling through pain, exhaustion, through grueling training and fights to the death. What he’d learned had been to block it out, to push through it. This, he’s completely unprepared for. He’s easily undone.

Orm’s thighs splay open on his own, and he thinks, deliriously, that if this is what whores do they’re the lucky ones.

“Can- can I-” Arthur pants, like this is undoing him too and Orm tongues at him, along the dark lines, feeling lazy and liquid.

There’s only split second of half-remembered panic when Arthur wraps a big hand around his hip to steady himself and then he’s inside Orm, who’s not remotely virginal anymore.

There’s no word for the satisfying oddness of being so profoundly filled, of Arthur’s weight pressing down.

And then Arthur _rocks_ inside him and that’s even better, that’s _bliss_.

Orm feels so open, pried apart, owned and treasured. Arthur’s face cracks open above him, startlingly beautiful, like volcanic fire.

His hands are tight around Orm’s hips, thighs, sounds spilling heedlessly from his lips. With every thrust, Arthur stokes something inside Orm, something he must have known was already there, a mirror of himself.

He and his husband are the same, the skin and heat and desire. If this is animal, base, debauched, they are in it together.

He’s close now, the final ecstasy so very close at hand, when Arthur stutters, grabs his hip with bruising force and thrusts deeper than he has before.

Orm can feel him finish deep inside, which might be more welcome if he’d finished too, and can hear himself whine.

“Fuck” Arthur groans and Orm stiffens, suddenly cold and alone in his skin again, cursing himself for being so stupid, so blind, so easily taken in like a gutter girl, only a few sweet kisses to allow himself to become entirely dissolute. To forget to protect himself.

He expects his husband to move away, a narrow window in which he can escape with what little remains of his dignity, when Arthur’s eyes go hard and determined.

There isn’t even time to be afraid between the heartbeat that passed from Arthur’s sudden whispered apology and his sudden burst of movement, hooking Orm’s knees over his shoulders.

Orm sees the room upside down, feels the heat from Arthur’s skin on his back, thinks, inanely, _he couldn’t do this on land, I’d bet_ when he feels Arthur’s breath on his slit and thinks _No._

It’s too late to stop him, the flat drag of his tongue knocking the air out Orm.

His hands had dug into Arthur’s hair to pull him away, embarrassed at being seen so closely even if Arthur had to know what was between his legs, but now he pulls Arthur in closer.

It was the dirtiest thing he knew of, sin a way he’d never thought of, and he _loved_ it, crying out so Arthur would know how much.

Arthur could probably taste himself, he was probably defeating the whole purpose of it, licking it away.

If Orm was a proper husband, dutiful and pious he should have pulled away immediately.

Instead, Orm clamped his thighs around his husband’s head and fucked himself on his tongue.

_I want this to be good for you,_ Arthur had said. It was better than good, better than Orm had ever imagined it could be.

He came screaming.

*

Afterward, both of them were clumsy, sticky, tangled in the bedsheets.

“C’mere” Arthur had rumbled when Orm had tried to put them to rights, settling Orm on his chest instead.

Orm had a feeling it would be too cold soon, to stay that way. But he couldn’t deny enjoying it.

When Arthur runs his hand over Orm’s back, fingers tracing the line of his spine, he finds himself reveling in the shivers it sends through him.

Orm had thought he knew everything his body was capable of. But it seems their marriage will be an education for him too.

“That was good” Arthur says, a laugh in his voice.

“Merely good?” Orm says archly, or tries to, anyway. It comes out teasing.

“To be honest, I thought you might try to stab me when I got close, so better than expected”.

“I did consider it” he says, letting Arthur think it’s a joke. It feels like one, now.

“Can’t wait to see what round two will be like” he says, with a secret smile that brushes its fingers against Orm’s heart.

“We cannot spend our entire marriage in bed” he says, just to be contrary.

“Nah, I know that. But the honeymoon? Hell yeah” he says with a grin.

Orm can’t help but smile back.

Arthur’s face changes.

“First time you’ve done that for me” he says, sounding close to awed.

He kisses Orm so carefully, so sweetly, that Orm can't help but wrap his legs around him.

“Looks like round two already” Arthur whispers against his lips.

“Quiet” Orm says and makes sure neither of them speak a word for a very long time.

**Author's Note:**

> The title comes from a line from  [ _ To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time _ ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_the_Virgins,_to_Make_Much_of_Time) , because I’m hilarious.
> 
> I shamelessly stole most of  [ the bedding ceremony ](https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Bedding) elements from George R.R. Martin and I’m not sorry. 
> 
> And finally, if seals are basically sea wolves (being wild), it stands to reason that Atlanteans would have domesticated their own version of dogs. Like they did  [ with seahorses. ](https://io9.gizmodo.com/aquamans-going-to-be-even-more-inspired-by-dcs-comics-t-1826863032) The fact that  [ Arthur loves dogs  ](http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Aquadog_\(Prime_Earth\)) had something to do with my wanting to include that. 


End file.
